A specification, not an order
What travels between sites is a written standard — models, quantities, finishes and the terms attached to them. The order is what falls out of it.
Equipping a gym chain: a specification that survives being repeated
Fitting out one site is a project. Fitting out the fifth is a system. What changes is not the equipment but everything around it — lead times, spare parts, who orders, and whether the numbers from two clubs can be compared at all.
The difference
The second site is where a one-off fit-out stops working
A single gym can be specified by whoever is closest to it. A group cannot: the moment the same decision is taken twice by different people, the estate starts to drift. Different consoles, different spare parts, different flooring under the same rack, and a report that cannot add two clubs together because they count members differently. None of it is visible at site two. All of it is expensive at site six.
Service has to reach every site
A warranty is only as good as the engineer who can get there. Response times belong in the agreement before the first delivery, not after the first breakdown.
Comparable numbers or none
If two clubs run different systems, the group has anecdotes instead of data. One platform across sites is what makes performance a fact.
The standard
What changes when a fit-out is repeated
The equipment list is the easy half. These are the decisions that only appear once the same build happens more than once:
| Decision | What it looks like across sites |
|---|---|
| Equipment specification | One written standard per format, so a new site is an order rather than a fresh round of research. |
| Lead times | Openings are dated. Production and shipping windows have to be booked against those dates, not discovered near them. |
| Spare parts and consumables | Common parts across the estate mean one stock instead of one per site, and a part that fits whichever club needs it. |
| Service and response | Agreed response times that cover every location you operate, with the escalation route written down. |
| Flooring and fit-out | The part most often left local and most often regretted: the same rack on two different floors behaves differently. |
| Software and reporting | One platform across sites, so retention, usage and revenue can be compared rather than described. |
| Access and opening hours | Access control is what lets a smaller site open longer than it could be staffed, and it has to work the same way at every door. |
| Cleaning standard | Scheduled robotic cleaning gives the same floor condition at every site, independent of which team is on shift. |
| Deliberate local variation | Not everything should match. Catchment, building and surface area differ, and the standard should say where variation is allowed. |
Which of these you set centrally and which you leave to each site is a strategy decision, not a supply one. We put the options side by side with what each costs you in flexibility.
Franchise
A franchisee orders against a standard, not against a catalogue
In a franchise the group does not place the order, which makes the specification the only control there is. Done well it is a short document a franchisee can order from without ringing head office: what the format requires, what is substitutable, what is not, and the terms already negotiated. Done badly it is a brand manual with pictures, and every new site becomes a negotiation. We work with the group to write the first and supply against it, so the franchisee gets a working floor and the brand stays recognisable.
Phasing
Most estates are mixed, and that is a plan rather than a problem
Almost no group replaces everything at once, and almost none should. What matters is the order: which sites are due, what their equipment still has left in it, and which upgrades unlock the others. Flooring, power and anchor points are the ones to settle early, because they are cheap while a site is open for refurbishment and expensive at any other moment. A rolling plan across the estate also spreads the spend, which is usually the constraint rather than the appetite.
What we do
Where FitLink fits in a rollout
We work with the group, not site by site. The specification is written once, the terms are negotiated once, and each opening draws on both.
- One written specification per format, in a document a site can order from
- Terms, lead times and service response agreed before the first site
- Scheduling against your opening dates rather than against stock
- Equipment, software and access decided as one system across the estate
- One contact for the group instead of one per supplier per site
Where to go next
Equipping a gym
The hub: zones, quantities and what the floor plan decides, for a single site.
Start at the beginningBoutique and group training
Where a group opens a smaller format alongside its main clubs.
Boutique studiosFunctional and strength floors
The zone most often standardised across an estate, and the one most sensitive to flooring.
Functional areasRollout, terms and common questions
No, and groups that try usually end up with a standard nobody follows. Standardise what affects cost and comparability — equipment families, spare parts, software, access. Leave what depends on the building and the catchment to the site, and write down which is which.
It changes the conversation, because a supplier is quoting against a programme rather than a single order. What that is worth depends on the manufacturer, the volume and the timing, and we will tell you what we actually get rather than what we hope for. Whatever is agreed goes in writing before you commit.
They stay in the plan. A mixed estate is normal: the standard applies to what gets replaced next, and the sequence follows what each site still has left in it rather than a tidy calendar.
That is the point of booking early. Production and shipping windows are the part of a rollout that cannot be compressed late, so we work backwards from the dates you have committed to.
Against the specification, directly, with the terms the group has already agreed. That keeps head office out of every transaction and still keeps the floors recognisable.
It has to, and it is a question for the manufacturer's service network rather than for us. We get the coverage and the response times stated in the agreement before the first delivery.
Tell us how many sites and when
Send us the formats you run, the openings you have dated and what the existing sites still have in them. You get a specification and a schedule, in writing.